‘I lost my baby girl’: Family remembers woman killed in road rage shooting

May 18, 2021 8:49 PM

Kaitlin Knapp,

Posted: May 18, 2021 8:49 PM

Updated: May 18, 2021 11:12 PM

by Kaitlin Knapp

SPOKANE, Wash. — Over the weekend, Erika Kienas was killed in a road rage shooting. Her mother is still trying to process what happened just days ago.

Kienas was shot in North Spokane on Saturday morning. The news of her death is hitting everyone she loved.

“I lost my baby girl,” said Yvonne Reiner, Kienas’s mom.

That morning, Reiner said she was planting outside when something strange came over her.

“I didn’t feel right,” she said. “I knew something was not right.”

Kienas was shot and killed on Francis Ave. and Addison St. Spokane Police said road rage ended in a fight. Kienas got out to argue with a man in the other car, Richard Hough.

According to court documents, Hough told police he thought Kienas was pulling a knife from her bra and said that is why he shot her.

“I mean, how can somebody just do this? It’s not right,” Reiner said.

Kienas was in the car with her boyfriend when it happened, according to Reiner. She told 4 News Now he texted her and said Kienas had been shot. Reiner said the boyfriend told the family he did not stay because he had warrants for his arrest, which is why he took off.

Spokane Police said they have talked to the boyfriend and he is cooperating with detectives. However, he has not been arrested for any crime.

“You just don’t leave somebody laying on the street,” Reiner said.

Kienas’s death has her mother reminiscing on the good and hard times.

“She’s been going through a lot of stuff. She was homeless. She got mixed up in the wrong crowd,” Reiner explained. “She loved camping. Her favorite thing in the world to do was fish.”

Reiner said her daughter was also an artist, and could paint anything.

She is not the only one processing the loss. So is Kienas’s 9-year-old son.

“His birthday being on the 11th and her passing on the 15th — he got a pretty rotten birthday present,” Reiner said.

Though Reiner had not talked to her daughter in nearly two months, it does not make the loss any easier.

“I love you and I would hug her with everything inside of me,” Reiner said.

Hough has been booked into the Spokane County Jail for second-degree murder. He is being held on a $750,000 bond.